Bank technology

BBVA has acquired San Francisco user-experience firm Spring Studio, in a bid to improve the look and feel of its digital banking services.

Just as the Apple Watch arrives to take over many of the functions of a fitness band, Jawbone has announced a new line of bracelets with payment features just like an Apple product.

HSBC has informed New Hampshire's Attorney General of a compromise of some records of current and former mortgage customers of its HSBC Finance unit. HSBC Finance is a nonbank lender, formerly known as Household Finance, that HSBC bought in 2003. The bank is in the process of winding it down.

LendKey, a white-label marketplace lender that partners with credit unions and community banks, has reached a deal to sell MidCap Financial up to $1 billion in student-consolidation loans.

Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, who sits on Lending Club's board, said in a speech Wednesday that such technology-focused marketplace lenders should be given a fair chance to compete.

As cybercriminals demonstrate their deep knowledge of banks' fraud and security rules, some institutions are deploying software that analyzes customers' and other entities' behavior for abnormalities.

The world needs a financial system that moves money with real-time transparency while upholding the highest level of security and privacy. Digital currency and mobile money services can help get us there.

Orchard Platform, an analytics firm that pairs institutional investors with marketplace lending platforms, has launched an investment-manager database

The banking industry as a whole will survive startups. But many individual banks will fail to make the changes necessary to stay relevant in a rapidly changing market.

MasterCard Inc. and Target Corp. are in talks about a settlement in which the retailer would pay banks about $20 million for costs they incurred in its 2013 data breach, a person familiar with the matter said.

Hackers are attacking companies with multiple motives and multiple attack vectors, the widely read annual security report finds. Phishing remains effective and cyber-threat sharing efforts need to speed up.

Marketplace lenders are aggressively marketing their loans as a way to refinance expensive credit card debt. And with more affordable interest rates and faster loan application processes, there's reason to believe that firms like Lending Club and SoFi will beat out banks.

Citibank and the online marketplace lender Lending Club, with the help of Varadero Capital, will provide $150 million in loans geared toward fulfilling Citi's community reinvestment obligations.

When Apple releases its smartwatch next week, there will be apps available from at least five banks — and four of them are community banks. Bankers see the apps as a way to get in early on a new platform, make banking more convenient and drive digital engagement.

Mobile wallet developers can find a suitable business partner in prepaid-card providers, who have already been down the path that mobile has just started.

The cost of complying with New York State's proposed BitLicense regulations would wipe out many smaller digital currency businesses. But there is a middle ground: placing those businesses under the supervision of a self-regulating incubator that would help them develop robust yet affordable compliance programs.

IMGCAP(1)]

While many banks prefer to be fast followers, RBC has a patent pending on mobile wallet technology. The goal is to secure a prominent place in customers' mobile wallets before it gets harder to do so.

A recap of the informed opinions (and the discussions they generated) on BankThink this week, including thoughts on regulatory complexity, Jamie Dimon's defense of the megabank model, and how vulnerable banks really are to tech startups.

Banking has less in common with industries like music and entertainment than it does with long-entrenched pharmaceutical, grocery store and airline businesses — all of which can absorb the threat of new entrants by adapting to them.